Tag Archives: popular culture

In spite of its many annoyances—inferior service, inedible food, lost luggage—there appears to be one positive about air travel: data show that it’s the safest form of transportation. Statistics drawn from the National Safety Council—“Lifetime Odds of Death for Selected Causes, United States, 2007”— indicate that over a lifetime, Americans have a 1 in 88 …Continue Reading

I am sure that my selections for the ten best American aviation genre films will be hotly contested. First, let me clarify what I mean by “aviation genre.” The aviation genre is defined by the manner in which an aviation film pays attention to characterization, values, actions, and iconography. Broadly speaking, the genre is about …Continue Reading

From April 20 to April 23, curators from the Aeronautics Division and the Space History Division attended the 2011 National Conference of the Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association (PCA/ACA) in San Antonio, Texas. Tom Crouch of the Aeronautics Division organized a session on museum collecting and collectors titled “Collecting the Popular Culture of Flight at …Continue Reading